Burn Scars
by XxXConnorXxX
Summary: A series of Richard Rory and Mick Rory's point of view as Richard struggles with PTSD after he returns from Vietnam.
1. Chapter 1

**Quick A/N: Thanks WolfKomoki for the name suggestion. Also, thank you to ****Ladyawesome45321 for deciding to be my beta. She's a good writer.**

**Sometime during the summer of 1973…**

The first thing that Richard noticed as he stepped into the terminal of the airport with the remainder of his brothers in tow was the yelling and shouting of protesters on his left side. He could hear them shouting crude remarks at the soldiers, and a burning rage ignited inside of him. Richard grunted, as he tried to push the emotions down and attempted not to pay any mind. As long as they didn't lash out at any of his men, or him… Despite this, was he excited to see his fiance? Yes, yes he was. He looked ahead and spotted her among the group of other women standing there waiting for their partners. Upon the sight of her, the rage inside Richard's gut was instantly replaced with a light, feathery sensation, as though he were floating in mid-air, the way simply seeing her always did to him. That was love, he supposed.

Three pm in the afternoon, Charlotte stood in the airport terminal with a handful of other women as they waited for their husbands to return home. Despite the group of soldiers that seemed to blend together, in one glance, she was able to spot her fiance, and her heart immediately began fluttering inside her rib cage. They had not laid eyes on each other for ages, and her body desperately yearned for him. Although, even though he didn't show it, she could tell that the war had affected him something awful. She could tell by the way that he carried himself, that he wasn't the same man that had left her. He was angrier, more violent and hostile. It frightened her slightly. Still, she found herself excited by his presence and hurrying to meet him. However, before she was able to hug him, a protester ran over and tried to shove him, only to get shoved to the ground himself.

"Get off me!" Richard shouted.

Charlotte watched, her mouth opening and closing as Richard had to be held back by one of the other soldiers.

"Hey! Come on! It's not worth it! It's not worth it!" he shouted.

Richard growled and shoved passed him to go to Charlotte. When he finally got to her, he held her in his arms tightly and didn't let go for literally two minutes. Tears started rolling down his face, he didn't know he could still cry. He missed her so much.


	2. Chapter 2

**Finally, another chapter. I know it's not much but at least it's something. Again, I thank my beta, she's a great help. And I thank Woflkomoki for the name suggestion of Charlotte.**

-March 13 1974, Wednesday sometime in the late afternoon-

Richard stared at the crib in the nursery among the others.

Mick Rory the tag had said.

Richard smiled proudly. He was actually a father, he was also scared too. The months had not been kind to him as he suffered through many many nights where he would wake up screaming because one of his brothers had died or was near death. He had married Charlotte though, half of him hoping that would give him some hope that being away from the war would make him less scared, less terrified. No, that only intensified the emotions and nightmares. He started drinking more, and distancing himself from his wife, especially the last few months. He hoped that his child would change that. He hoped that if he knew that he would have to take care of another human being that he would get better.

"Can I see him?" he asked the doctor that walked by him.

The man looked to Richard. "Which one's yours?" he asked.

"Mick Rory," Richard answered.

The man nodded. "Okay, I'll have one of the nurses bring him out to you."

Richard nodded. He then remembered what he was going to say. (He'd been forgetting a lot lately).

"Is...is he okay? I mean…"

"Yes sir, your baby is perfectly fine. Healthy."

Richard nodded relief flooding over him. "Thank you doctor."

He watched as the doctor left. Minutes later, a nurse came back out with Mick in her arms, he was fussing a bit, until he got into his dad's arms.

"Here you go sir," she said handing him over to Richard.

"Thank you ma'am," Richard said out of habit as he nodded to her slightly and took his son in his arms.

The nurse nodded and handed him a bottle that was already full.

"I think he's hungry," she said.

Richard nodded and took the bottle from her, thanking her again. As he walked with his son in his arms to the cafeteria to get something to eat himself, he glanced down at him and forced a smile. Why was it that his own son seems foreign to him? It felt as if this was not his child that his wife had given birth to.


	3. Chapter 3

**Another chapter down, a lot more to go. Again, I thank Ladyawesome45321 for helping me edit this thing. Big help.**

Four months seemed to go by slowly. Every day, Richard seemed to be getting worse and worse. He was fortunate enough to not be harassed by others mainly because he kept his scars covered, but he remembered the letters that his army buddies had sent them because they went home before he did. Richard was drinking more often trying to get rid of the nightmares and daymares that were a constant plague to him. HIs son and wife seemed foreign to him. He'd often sleep in the front room on the couch. He was terrified that he would hurt them in his sleep.

One day, Richard was watching the news, he had no idea why he had stopped on that channel, but he did. The station featured a news anchor talking about the Vietnam protests that were still going on. There were several empty beer bottles on the coffee table.

"Protestors are calling American soldiers disgusting and baby killers. They have no moral compass."  
Richard felt his blood boil. He felt his cheeks get hot. He threw a bottle at the tv and jumped to his feet.

"That's a lie!" he shouted his voice slurring, at the tv.

_He continued to watch as footage of the war was played. Richard winced and went over and turned off the tv. It was too late, though. He sat on the ground putting his hands over his head as he started hearing the loud bombs. _

_Fighter planes flew overhead dropping napalm. Loud explosions could be heard in his head with gunfire. In his mind, he heard one of his buddies yelling in pure agony as his leg got shot. His leg was draining blood. _

In reality, Richard was still covering his head with his hands. He vaguely heard his wife come into the room. When he finally looked up, he saw that her eyes were wide with half fear and half concern as she held a crying Mick in her arms. Richard slowly blinked as he started coming out of the flashback that he was having.

"What...what happened?" he asked.

Charlotte hesitated for what seemed like a solid minute before she answered.

"You were screaming," she said. "You were screaming loudly."  
Richard frowned and reached out his arms. He wanted to comfort his son. He saw Charlotte hesitate before she handed him over. Richard held his son close to him rubbing his back.

"Hey, it's okay, daddy's sorry," he mumbled to him as he held him close to his chest, eventually soothing the tiny baby who by now had quit crying and was just being silent in his arms, occasionally sniffing.

* * *

A couple of weeks passed since Richard went through that flashback. He seemed to be doing better, even if he did not feel that way. He put up a good front for Charlotte and Mick. One day it occurred to him, he needed to get Mick set up with a fund for college. Maybe he would go to college maybe not, but in case he wanted to...One day, Richard got dressed in a T-shirt and jeans. It was too hot to wear a long sleeve shirt or jacket and that would quickly become an annoyance to him and make him angry. He walked out to get into his car to see a random woman on the street staring at him, his scars mainly. He glared at her.

"What the fuck are you looking at?" he said.

The woman turned away and started walking faster. Richard rolled his eyes letting out a heavy sigh in frustration. Seriously? He got into the car, started it up, and backed his way out of the driveway on his way to the bank.

When he had gotten there and gotten out, again, everyone was staring at him. Richard forced himself to take a breath. They weren't attacking him. Leave it be. He got to the front of the counter.

"Good morning, how may I help you?" a woman behind the counter asked.

"Morning, ma'am. My name's Richard Rory. I was wondering if I could set up a college fund for my son," Richard asked.

Richard watched for her reaction as she looked up and got a good look at him. She frowned but nodded. "Yes sir," she said. "Follow me, we can get that setup.

Richard nodded and followed her as she got out from behind the counter. As they were talking and she was setting up the account, Richard noticed that Susan, he saw on the plaque of her desk kept staring at him. He sighed and finally gave in.

"What?" Richard asked.

"Did you serve in Vietnam?"  
"I'm sure you already know the answer to that question," Richard sneered.

Richard glared when Susan literally threw the chequebook at him.

"I'm sorry, I can't serve you, please leave sir."  
Richard shot up and shoved the chair. He turned and stormed out not saying another word to her.

When Richard got home, he ignored Charlotte and their son straight to his bedroom and took a shoebox out from the back of the closet. He opened it up and took out the pile of crumpled pieces of paper, letters that his buddies sent him.

_It's terrible back here, everyone's treating me and the rest of us like dirt. They spit at us and call us vile and murderers. If I get shoved one more time, I might go to jail for killing them. _

Richard huffed as he continued to read the other letters that his buddies had sent him, all of them more or less saying the same thing.

_The VA is no help at all. Nobody knows what really happened._ Richard put the letters back in the shoe box and put the shoe box back in the back of the closet. After that, he stormed downstairs to the kitchen. He opened the fridge and downed another beer. Minutes later, he passed out on the kitchen floor.


	4. Chapter 4

Seven ish years later

Seven years seemed to fly by faster then Richard had imagined. As the weeks turned to the months which turned to years, Richard was getting worse and worse by the day. The nightmares seemed to be getting worse and worse. Richard tried going to doctor after doctor but every one of them kept telling him that it was nothing, the nightmares would pass, they'll pass. Yeah, well, the nightmares and day terrors were not passing at all, to make matters worse, the VA was not helping him or his family which made Richard stress even more, in turn, making him drink more making his wife and child on the receiving end of everything.

* * *

Mick thinks it started when he was around seven years old.

He was playing with a kid in class throwing paper balls at a girl.

"Would you two stop it!" The girl shouted.

Mick blinked when the teacher looked up. The yelling girl tattled on them. Of course! Miss Jane walked up to Mick and Travis.

"You two can miss recess now, I told you before to leave Kate alone."

Mick's heart went cold as Miss Jill went over to her desk and started to write out a detention paper. When she came up to Mick's desk, he took the paper with shaky hands.

"I would like one of your parents to sign this," She said.

Mick started shaking his head as he took out his folder and put the paper in it.

"No, not today, today's Friday," he said. "Today's Friday."

Miss Jill looked at him with questioning eyes but didn't press any further.

"I'm sorry, but there are consequences to your actions young

man."

Mick sighed. The rest of the day seemed to go by agonizingly slow, he saw through the first recess and helped clean up the art project that everyone was working on. Come on, why can't this day be over with yet? Why is it not two o'clock yet?

Later that day, Mick stepped inside the house, careful to not scare his dad who was probably on the couch passed out anyway. Mick was right as he quietly stepped inside and saw his dad on the couch sleeping. He thinks he was sleeping at least. Mick hesitated for a second and watched as his chest rose. Okay. He was still breathing. Charlotte was at work right now so Mick placed the paper on the table next to the couch. Mick then quietly went down the hall to his room and closed the door. He put his backpack on the ground and turned on the tv. He laid down on his bed and watched tv, not really paying attention to it. Only imagining what his dad's reaction would be.

About an hour or two later, Mick sat up and quickly turned the tv off when he heard the squeak of heavy boots on their way down the hall. Mick's heart started to race as he watched the door opened and Richard peered inside.

"Why'd they make you miss recess?" he asked.

Mick shrugged. "I da know."

Mick flinched when he saw a look of annoyance on Richard's face as his eyebrows narrowed.

"What do you mean I don't know?" his voice was starting to rise.

"You do know, you just don't wanna tell me," Richard got closer to Mick

Mick hesitated for the longest time trying to think of an excuse. He honestly forgot why he got detention.

"Me and a boy were laughing too much," Mick said finally.

Seconds later, Mick got shoved back and hit the ground, his head hitting his dresser.

"Why did you lie to me?! I told you not to lie to me!" Richard finally shouted at him. "Are you really that stupid?!"

Mick gritted his teeth not moving from that spot, he tried his best not to let the tears seep through his eyes. The stinging from the slap across the face didn't hurt as bad as the words. He was stupid. He knew better than to use those words.

He watched silently as Richard crumbled up the paper and threw it at his head before exiting and slamming the door. Mick waited until he didn't hear his footsteps. Even after that, he still waited a few moments before going over to get the paper. With shaking hands, he unfolded it and smoothed it out. He looked at it. Mick sighed, letting a few tears escape onto the paper.

_At least he signed it._


End file.
